This is the in progress story of how I electrified my push-board.
Build history
When I built my first DIY, I realized that there were quite a few days when it would be out of service due to something being brokey. I needed a spare board, especially if I wanted to go on a longboard trip with my friends in Edinburgh, where my DIY would only get 5km of range on a good day. The sleek and sexy look of the Switchblade made me pull the trigger on this expensive deck, and it has probably been my favorite purchase of all time.
April 21st, 2019. Purchased from Sickboards: 50 degree caliber 2 trucks for a symmetrical turning feel, zealous bearings, and 80mm kegel wheels in orange to match. (All parts I could electrify one day) I had to mount the trucks using the new-school bolt pattern to get more clearance, but she rode like a dream! The concave of the deck gives you so much control, that you can pump, carve, and bomb hills all day long.
August 21st, 2020. I bought a bunch of TKP trucks from Surf-Rodz to see what the hype was all about. These are flipping awesome – it feels like an RKP truck, but if you could lean in even more to get even more turning! Now I could do 180 degree turns in my driveway, and dance around light poles as I waited for my train back home from work every day. TKP trucks have their hanger further towards the ends than RKP trucks, so my wheel bite-issue was resolved. But along came a minor issue – I could now turn so hard, that the edge of my deck would scrape the ground in drop-through 
I knew I needed slightly larger wheels, especially since these trucks were still stable enough to bomb hills.
April 18th, 2021. My grip-tape was losing its grip, and I wanted to sexify my board. Getting a board skinned is hard and expensive, but what isn’t, is hydro-dipping! Watched hours of tutorials online, bought a kiddie pool, got the right paint – but I guess it was just too cold at the time. The colors in this picture are really mute, but in the areas where the paint didn’t dry pre-maturely, the pattern looks really cool. I might return to this method one day, but for now I need to get my board in shape 
Did some spray painting, did some glass frit. Glass frit is easier than you think, although I didn’t mix my epoxy up correctly for the 1st layer. (Use a scale, seriously! First pour the resin, measure, then pour the hardener as you measure. Then you get perfect results 
) Also I didn’t use nearly enough frit, as I would slip off when carving hard. So after a 3rd layer, I had a very (subjectively) pretty looking board. I tried to go for a dripping graffiti effect with my neon orange, I guess? Kinda looks like a pepperoni pizza though. The neon orange looks fantastic IRL though, and matches the wheels perfectly when they’re clean.
July 21st, 2021. (Today) Switched the wheels to Caguamas, and put on a single Loaded x Unlimited hub motor. I want to keep the feeling of an analog deck close to the ground, so no bottom mounted enclosure! At the moment I’m using my 12s3P p42a back-pack battery built with NESE modules. I plant to use the same battery for my mountainboard as well. For now I just put it in a lunch box along with a Trampa vesc (will switch out to a cheap focer later), and a VX1 remote. (Don’t recommend, would constantly disconnect, had to switch out to another VX1 I had)
Oh, I also added some shredlights mounts I bought from @Edratuom
I went out on a quick test-ride, and have some thoughts!
- Hub motor at 20A is weak as shit. Definitely a push-assist board. But that’s what I was going for anyway
- Free-roll decrease is noticable. Wish I had bought 4 Caguama wheels rather than just 3 so I could swap if I run out of power on a longer journey.
- Top speed with 12s and 90% duty cycle limit is 35km/h according to my calculations. It’s plenty, you don’t wanna go faster on a board with close to no brakes
- The feeling of riding this is all I could have hoped for – feels like an analog board, close to the ground, great turning, but you can go fast without getting sweaty
- The lunch box takes up too much space on the deck. Gonna make longer phase wires and hold the electronics in my back-pack instead. Had it fall off the board as I was speeding down the street, that was a bit awkward
(And I don’t want to unstrap this thing every time I jump into a bus or train. The MR-60 connector is perfect for quickly disconnecting imo)
I’ll be taking this board with me to Lithuania this weekend, so I’ll get some pretty pictures and videos then! Will also do a range test. Wish I had telemetry, oh well. Thanks for reading and coming with me on my stupid fucking journey! 
